Corrections chief fired from her job

Ruth Vibert, first woman to head local jail, was let go last week

Published 10:04 pm, Monday, March 4, 2013

TROY – The chief of corrections hired by Rensselaer County Sheriff Jack Mahar amid a flurry last year of investigations into alleged wrongdoing at the jail has been fired.

Ruth Vibert got the job in March 2012 with the promise she would bring a higher level of professionalism to the jail, but Mahar on Monday confirmed the 49-year-old Pittstown woman was let go last week from her $85,078-a-year job. She was the first woman to head a county jail in the Capital Region and the fourth in the state.

"I really can't comment much on it because it is a personnel matter, but Ruth failed to meet the minimum standards under civil service law to keep her job," Mahar said.

Officials familiar with the case said that Vibert's job agreement required her to finish some college credits, but that she was unable to do so.

Mahar did not say whether the position would be filled.

Vibert was sworn in on March 19 to head the Bureau of Corrections at the 473-bed jail just as state and federal law enforcement agencies launched broad investigations into the activities of the correction officers, including whether their initiative to garner inmates' votes violated state or federal laws. The probes are part of a broader investigation that began when a group of correction officers accused their labor leaders of fraud and looting union dues for personal use.

A month before Vibert was hired, the Times Union reported that law enforcement agencies were checking allegations that correction officers at the jail had pushed inmates to register and vote in previous fall's primary and general elections as part of an effort to unseat Mahar. That probe had dovetailed with a broader investigation by federal authorities, including the Internal Revenue Service, into allegations made by a group of correction officers who accused their labor leaders of fraud and looting union dues for personal use.

No charges have been filed.

Vibert's firing comes at a time when the jail is again under renewed scrutiny, this time over allegations employees violated the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 by using jail computers to access personnel medical files at Samaritan Hospital.

It was alleged that some jail personnel, mostly people out on disability or injury, had their medical information illegally accessed by someone at the jail. It was also alleged that a private individual's medical records may have been breached. At least two people in the jail's nursing department have been suspended amid the probe.

Mahar said last week that simultaneous internal and criminal investigations are under way after officials at Samaritan Hospital discovered and reported to him that someone with access to a nursing administrator's computer was looking at the private medical records.

The city-based hospital has contracts with the jail to treat inmates and correction officers with job-related injuries.

Officials on Monday said that gaining access to Samaritan Hospital records were easy for anyone who had access to computers in the jail's nursing department because the password to get into the record system was written on a Post-It note stuck to the computer console.

Samaritan spokesman Elmer Streeter said the link has been disabled and there are no allegations of wrongdoing involving Samaritan staff.